Hand of Death

by Margaret Yorke

  She gave it no further thought, scrumpling her grubby handkerchief up and putting it back in her pocket.

  When Ronald dropped her outside her own home that night, the lights were on in both bungalows. It was nice to be hurrying in from the cold and the darkness to brightness and warmth, and a waiting meal. Lynn was going to a folk dance evening with Peter and he was coming to fetch her. Under her father’s new stringent rules for her safety, she was never to walk alone in the dark. It seemed silly to Lynn, but anyway it was much nicer being with Peter, and he was coming to supper.

  Uncle Ron patted her gloved hand before she got out of the van, thanking her for her day’s work. He’d already paid her from the till. She barely registered the fact that he brushed against her, leaning across to open the van door for her. She was used to it.

  Ronald watched her run up the drive to her own front door, open it and disappear, before he turned in at his own gate. She never turned back to look at him, but he always hoped she would.

  He was still thinking of her when Nancy was serving their dinner.

  10

  The radio forecast sunshine on Sunday, but, when Ronald went into the garden to dig the bare section of the vegetable bed where leeks and savoys had grown, the sky was still overcast. A neat strip of ground, dug to take advantage of winter frosts, bordered the part he was working on; soon he would sow broad beans and plant potatoes there. Ronald pulled out the thick, faded stalks of the savoys and made a heap of them at the bonfire spot.

  Nancy was in the kitchen making an apple pie to go with the roast pork for lunch. She’d dusted round, after making the beds; just because it was Sunday, there was no excuse for letting up on standards.

  By half-past twelve, Ronald had a hearty appetite. He came in by the back door, took off his boots and left them in the porch, and in his socks padded over the spotless, grey-marbled-effect Marley tiled floor of the kitchen. Even when she was cooking, there was no mess around Nancy: morsels that fell on the floor were noticed at once and wiped up immediately; the stove gleamed as pristine as when it was new, many years ago. An enticing smell filled the room.

  ‘Smells good,’ remarked Ronald. He said this at the same hour every Sunday, and it was always true.

  ‘It’ll be ready sharp at one,’ said Nancy, piling shredded cabbage into a pan. It always was.

  Over lunch, as the weather was improving, they decided to go into the country for the afternoon. Nancy had been reading a feature in the local paper about property values, and had noted a village where there were still a number of the original inhabitants living in cottages which might one day be available for modernisation. Dewton had not been developed by speculators; in a sense it could be called a dying village, with few young people living there, though there were already weekenders in some of the cottages. There might be scope for some careful knocking, Nancy thought; each year Ronald tracked down a few clocks by calls at spots Nancy had selected. They’d inspect Dewton.

  While Nancy washed up, Ronald prepared the van for their expedition. He cleaned the windscreen and rear window; there wasn’t time to wash the whole van, a thing he often did on Sundays. He wished they had an estate car. The business was prospering, and it would be a legitimate expense to set against profits. He mentioned it to Nancy as they set off.

  She favoured the idea. The shabby van was not in keeping with the true status she felt they had achieved. Sitting beside him in her black and white herringbone-tweed coat, with a yellow silk scarf at her neck and her tinted hair inflexibly arranged, she felt herself to be a prize portrait inappropriately framed.

  Dewton, when they reached it, seemed to be just a row of cottages lining each side of a narrow, undulating lane.

  ‘What a dead place,’ said Nancy.

  Some of the cottages were thatched, the thatch in many cases black and sagging, with mossy patches and gulleys dredged by rain pouring down from eroded ridges. Halfway along the street a cottage had been gutted by fire, and stark, black beams poked up into the pale sky. A cement mixer stood in the front garden, and a builder’s sign was attached to the fence. There was one cottage with a spanking new pale thatch, a blonde among the rest; its door and window frames were painted yellow. The white-painted plaster between the beams of the construction shone the more brightly because of its contrast with the drab exteriors of the neighbouring cottages. They might all look like this in ten years’ time, fully renovated.

  Smoke spiralled from a few chimneys. There were no walkers about, and only two cars were parked at the roadside. It looked promising territory.

  ‘You could try here, Ronald,’ Nancy said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Not today. It would be wrong on Sunday. But don’t leave it – why not come down on Wednesday?’ Nancy suggested. ‘You’re not going to a sale this week, are you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Very well, then.’

  They drove past a country mansion which later in the year would be open to the public, regretting that they could not enter now and gaze upon its treasure. Such visits were instructive; they sometimes called at stately homes to look upon rare objects.

  ‘Shall we go back through Fletcham? We might have tea there,’ Ronald suggested.

  ‘That would be nice,’ said Nancy.

  They were soon travelling along the road down which Ronald had followed Felicity Cartwright the week before. He noted the turning to the estate where she lived.

  Fletcham Abbey dominated the town. Ronald and Nancy went into it and looked around. Small groups of sightseers trod respectfully on the ancient stone floor and gazed at the tombs of long-dead abbots. Later in the year, tourists would mill about the aisles. A cassocked figure was preparing for an evening service, moving among the pews. A few people sat, either resting or meditating; one woman knelt, head bowed.

  Leaving the abbey, Ronald and Nancy walked on, looking in shop windows, strolling; they traversed the length of Market Street and came to an antique shop called the Treasure Box. It had a narrow front, between a dress shop and a chemist. In the window were displayed silver objects in a case and several good small boxes – needlework boxes and, he was sure, the writing box he had sold to Mrs Felicity Cartwright. So this was her place. He felt perversely glad to see the box still unsold. The price tag was turned over so that the figure on it was concealed. It looked as if she specialised in boxes.

  As it was Sunday, the cafes were closed, so they went to the Bell Hotel, where afternoon tea was served in the lounge. Nancy enjoyed walking in ahead of Ronald; they made, she was sure, a handsome pair. No longer young, true, but well turned out and, as must be obvious, quite devoted.

  Ronald, ordering tea and toasted tea-cakes, noticed the trim figure of the waitress, her slim waist and narrow ankles. He smiled into her eyes, suggesting cakes to follow.

  Daniel Fortescue telephoned his father that Sunday afternoon.

  He’d had a long talk with his girlfriend about the split between his parents.

  ‘Couldn’t you get them together?’ Vivian said. ‘A friendly meeting, I mean – sort of casual? After all, neither of them’s gone off with someone else. Mightn’t they make it up? It’s probably all just some silly quarrel and they’re both too proud to say sorry.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Daniel said. ‘Mum’s in such good spirits. I don’t ever remember her being like this. She looks years younger.’

  ‘Perhaps your father will fall for her all over again,’ said Vivian. ‘Maybe that’s what it needs.’

  ‘We could give it a try,’ said Daniel. ‘Poor old Dad, having to manage on his own. He lives on frozen food. Mum’s very capable and he must miss all that. And there’s this jogging he’s taken up. He’s much too old for that sort of thing.’ To Daniel, who saw his parents as well over the hump, it was shocking that they should be behaving in what seemed such an adolescent fashion. After the age of forty, people’s parents stuck it out; splitting up, if things didn’t work out, was for younger folk, and preferably before they went so
far as getting married.

  ‘Let’s take them out to dinner somewhere romantic,’ Vivian suggested. ‘Let’s ask each of them to meet us, and not tell them the other one is coming. How about that for an idea? They might refuse, if they knew, and this way, because of us, they’ll have to cool it. Won’t they?’

  ‘You’re a genius,’ Daniel said. ‘What an inspiration. The Sorrento, eh? When shall we do it?’

  They consulted their engagement diaries. Both were involved with university societies as well as work and one another. Wednesday, it seemed, was free, however.

  Daniel went to the telephone in the hall of his digs, where this conference had taken place. Despite their unpredictability, it was likely that both his parents would be available to answer the telephone on a Sunday afternoon, though George might be at golf. If so, they’d catch him later. His parents, Daniel thought, were hardly likely to refuse.

  Valerie kept her children close to her on Sunday. She cooked breast of lamb for lunch, played cars with Timmy and made a dress for Melissa’s doll. In the afternoon they went to Fell Farm to look at the Mounts’ new donkey. The children had wanted to go over the fields again; they’d enjoyed their tea with Mrs Wyatt the day before and thought a repeat would be nice. So did Valerie, but she was not going to hang round the Manor House. Mrs Wyatt, when departing the evening before, had pressed her to come again, but Valerie would wait to be invited.

  She did a big wash that day, pegging everything out to blow freshly in the cold air, though it was not likely to get dry. She still felt unclean, and she had another fear that filled her with dread. Supposing she were pregnant? The police might believe her, if that turned out to be the case, she thought grimly.

  After tea, she played Happy Families with the children. Timmy, still a diffident reader, needed help from time to time, but could identify most of the characters by their pictures. The fire was well stoked up, the doors were soundly locked and bolted, and the chains secured. Truffles lay sleeping in his basket.

  Ronald lay awake in bed that night, planning. Beside him, in the other bed, Nancy snored lightly; it was a friendly sound and normally never disturbed him.

  It hadn’t been right with Valerie. For one thing, she was a young, strong girl and, if he hadn’t had the knife, he’d have got nowhere. She’d submitted, straight away, when threatened. There had been her kids, of course; saying he’d go for them had been a good idea. But it had been very different from the interlude with Dorothea Wyatt. There’d been no warm response; it was all so quick.

  It occurred to him that Valerie, living alone as she did, might have responded to an open approach, like the women mentioned by the young men in the Plough. How did they do it so easily? According to some, all you had to do was raise your little finger, in a manner of speaking, and there you were. But he’d tried with that Felicity Cartwright and been rebuffed. When you came to think about it, she’d seen him off good and proper. The snub rankled. Who did she think she was?

  He thought about her, gazing at the ceiling in the darkness, his mind full of visions. There were other ways than the one he’d used with Valerie.

  Nancy had already decreed that he should visit Dewton on Wednesday, and that was close to Fletcham.

  He worked out what to do, lying in the dark. He’d need the knife.

  Planning it took his mind off Lynn. She was the one he really wanted, but she was too young.

  11

  Detective Constable Cooley had plenty of cases to deal with; an alleged rape was merely a diversion. There had been a break-in at a shop in Tellingford from which radios had been stolen, an incident of suspected arson, and several burglaries, all of which had to be investigated, besides various outbreaks of vandalism. But on Wednesday, when he was returning to the police station from a farm where a barn had been set alight, and had to pass through Crowbury, Cooley turned aside down Ship Lane.

  His boss, Detective Sergeant Gower, had dismissed Valerie Turner’s complaint as a fantasy. It was on file, a telex had gone to all stations, but no time would be wasted on investigation of what had been imagined by a neurotic woman who knew a doctor would prove her allegations false. She’d soon be on to them again with some other invented tale – anonymous letters, or obscene telephone calls, was Gower’s theory.

  But Cooley had been to the cottage, had seen how jumpy Valerie was, had noticed her clenched hands. Gower explained these signs as indications of her neurosis, but Cooley’s instinct told him her story was true.

  She was working in the garage. He could hear the sander buzzing. It would have drowned the sound of his car approaching, as it would have masked any noise the rapist made that night.

  Cooley banged hard on the door and rattled it.

  Inside, Valerie sensed some sound above that of the sander and looked up. She worked facing the door now. By her side was a large hammer. She would not be found unable to defend herself, another time. Truffles was with her, too; unferocious, it was true, but company.

  ‘Who is it?’ she called.

  She was expecting no one. Ronald had been in earlier, collecting finished work, and he brought three painted chests from the house-clearer where he got so much cheap stuff. He’d a busy day ahead, he’d told her, explaining his early call.

  ‘Still locking up, I see,’ he’d said, as she undid her bolts and chains to let him in.

  ‘Yes. I expect you think that’s silly,’ she’d replied, defensively.

  ‘Not at all. You can’t be too careful,’ Ronald had remarked. ‘I’d be annoyed if any of my pieces were stolen from your place, Valerie, and you’d be responsible.’

  She hadn’t thought of that. Would her insurance cover such a thing?

  Cooley announced his identity and looked approvingly at her defences when she opened the door to him. She faced him with an air of defiance, a short, stocky girl, her body stiff, hands clenched by her sides.

  ‘Look, love, I haven’t come to badger you with questions,’ Cooley said at once. ‘I was passing and I just wanted to see that you’re all right. That’s all.’

  Valerie relaxed slightly. She turned away from him.

  ‘Depends what you mean by all right,’ she muttered.

  ‘Well . . .’ Cooley sought about for a positive comment. ‘I see you’ve started locking up, for a start. That’s good.’

  ‘I’ve fixed up chains and bolts on all the doors, yes,’ said Valerie. ‘But I should think anyone who really meant to could still get in. It wouldn’t take too much to break these doors down.’

  ‘You could get the crime prevention officer to call,’ said Cooley. ‘He’d advise you. It’s a free service. He’d tell you about locks on the windows and all that sort of thing.’

  ‘I’ve nothing much worth stealing, if you’re thinking of burglars,’ said Valerie.

  ‘Everyone has something,’ Cooley said. ‘A bit of money lying about, a ring, a radio. Some thieves nick things just to use themselves.’

  ‘Do they ever go to the same place twice?’ asked Valerie. ‘You know . . . those . . .’ She could not say the word.

  ‘Rapists?’

  She nodded.

  ‘I can’t remember one that has,’ said Cooley, but he could think of several vicious ones who had haunted a particular district. ‘Sometimes they’ll be prowlers in a car. Yours was probably one of those. He won’t come back here. You should put that right out of your head.’

  ‘It’s not so easy to do,’ said Valerie.

  ‘No, I don’t suppose it is,’ said Cooley.

  ‘You’re acting as if you believed me now,’ said Valerie.

  ‘I never said I didn’t,’ said Cooley promptly.

  ‘Well – up at the station – those other policemen . . . they didn’t,’ said Valerie.

  ‘We get a lot of reports that aren’t true,’ said Cooley. ‘Girls tear their clothes, that sort of thing. Or lead a fellow on and then say he attacked them. It’s difficult to prove. After all, you and I are here alone now. What’s to stop you running up
the road saying I went for you? It’d be your word against mine, wouldn’t it?’

  She hadn’t thought of it like that.

  ‘Male motorists picking up girl hitch-hikers are asking for trouble,’ Cooley said. He saw this was a novel idea to Valerie. ‘Look, why don’t we have a little chat, eh? You’ve had a while to get over it – something might occur to you that you forgot at the time. How about a cup of tea?’

  Valerie looked at the drawer she was working on. She still had a lot to do, to get through what she’d planned for the day, and it would soon be time to fetch the children from school. But she could spare half an hour.

  She led the way to the cottage, taking the back-door key out of the pocket of her slacks.

  ‘It’s an awful nuisance, whenever I go in and out,’ she said. ‘But I imagine him inside, lying in wait for me.’

  ‘I’m sure he won’t come back,’ Cooley said. ‘Really, love, lightning doesn’t strike in the same place twice, you know.’ He crossed his fingers, saying this.

  All Valerie knew was that she would never forget it. She had been invaded, defiled; how could she welcome a man within her, ever again? And what man, if he knew what had happened to her, would want her in that way?

  Truffles followed them into the kitchen, where Valerie put on the kettle, and they sat at the table among Timmy’s model cars and Melissa’s plaster models, her new interest.

  ‘He was heavy, the man,’ Valerie said abruptly, pouring tea into pottery mugs. ‘Sugar?’

  ‘Yes, please,’ said Cooley. ‘Heavy?’ he prompted.

  ‘Yes. He—he pinned me down. It was awful – like an animal.’ Her voice was gruff as she tried to speak steadily. ‘He was so strong. I suppose he must have been a large man.’